Final Projects!
Hey everyone, I just got out of my first group meeting for our final essay. We really went into detail with what we were going to write about and who was going to write about what. Our topic is how media, specifically in Elle magazine, influences women. We broke this topic into the myths and realities of diet and exercise, psychological and physical effects, media coverage in science and on women and their rights and lastly what health in women in perceived as. For us we broke down our essay by sections and each person has one or two sections to write. We also decided to write the introduction and the conclusion together.
How are other groups breaking down their projects and going about their essays? Also, I’d love to hear about other topics/ pitches from the other class!
A class blog on science and science journalism 
I am not going to be of much help with how things are going in the other groups, seeing as I am also in the Elle group, but I thought it helped a lot to go over the topic with everyone there. I did not really have an idea of what I was specifically going to do for the project, or what I could bring to it exactly. I liked the psychological aspect that I am writing and think that everyone seems to have some aspect that they are more interested in or know more about like media or biology. I think getting together really made sense of how everyone saw the project going and what they wanted to get out of it. Plus we all seemed to get excited about it and feel more ready to write the essay, rather than just being nervous about a group project.
I am also in the Elle group, but I wanted to share that I was pleasantly surprised after meeting with our group today. I was very apprehensive about doing this final project as a group, especially because the topic that was chosen was mine and I have the tendency to micromanage this kind of thing. However, we met today and as both Priyanka and lmorella have said, we split up the paper into different sections. I found that everyone was enthusiastic about the section that they chose, and I think that they can each contribute something different and interesting to the paper to make it a very dynamic piece. I’m happy that I am able to focus on something that I’m really interested in, and I think this is what will help make the project successful.
In the Reddit.com group, we discussed our allocation of labor, assessed our primary sources, and began planning for our annotated bibliography. At the moment the annotated bibliography is our number one priority.
I am also in the Elle group, and I was equally happy with how our meeting went. I’m happy to have mapped out what each person’s responsibilities are and am now swamped with reading material to find relevant sources for my topic. I was very happy to have class time this week to work on our research, as it is difficult to coordinate our 5 schedules and it’s helpful for us to do research around one another if we have questions or suggestions for each other. I’m getting nervous about the annotated bibliography but am happy that I have 4 other group members to help me out if I get lost in what to say.